It’s Helmar Tuesday. More than 100 hand-made cards up for auction!!

[oldphil]

Love these cards. Been buying them for a few months now. Also, no need to get them graded!

[bbcard1]

To each his own. No interest here. Not saying they aren't pretty, but frankly, I'll do my own if I wanted such things.

I wonder how they get around using images of people who are legally protected such as Ruth, Mantle and Cobb.

[Mdmtx]

I have bought a few. I personally think they are inexpensive compared to other limited quantity collectibles and they depict images in the arena I like. I especially like the images of baseball folks that can't be found elsewhere in a card format. Like Gus greenlee. I believe these will appreciate in value, and if they don't I'm not out too much anyway and I will have something I enjoy regardless of value. Just my .02

Mark Medlin

[JustinD]

As they are unlicensed and frankly, likely contractually illegal prints of protected rights of licensed figures I see absolutely no possibility of actual true appreciation as no grader or catalog will ever touch these with a 10 foot pole.

However, to each their own and actual worth is really just determined on who is in the room at the time. As I tell people who are upset at home appraisal values, if I have a dollar bill I have to sell and no one in the room will offer more than 25 cents...it's really worth 25 cents at that time. If they all will pay 10 bucks, then it's ten bucks. Just depends on the day and the room.

Charles does a good job selling these at good returns with his marketing, however the ones I see come up on the secondary market often seem to go at a loss. I believe REA tried auctioning off a large collection of Helmars a few years ago and they averaged about 10 bucks a card, I imagine at the crazy prices some of these get the seller lost his shirt.

[Exhibitman]

Well, the originals like Jay has are very nice little paintings. The cards are Broders as far as I am concerned. That said, I collect some unlicensed cards, especially from the 1970s. They can be quite interesting additions to a collection. Not sure how these Helmar thingies will fare. I've bid on a few of the Joe Louis ones but don't want to spend any real money on what I view as a novelty item.

The right of publicity varies from state to state in terms of protection of deceased persons. Most places have a cap on it. Cali, for example, caps the heirs' control at 70 years post-death and I think that is one of the longest, so odds are the Helmar pics of guys who've been dead for more than that time are immune to lawsuits on publicity issues in nearly all states. I think Tennessee has a perpetual law (Elvis).

[sirraffles]

Cards aside for the moment, I think each of you would enjoy the latest issue of my magazine, Baseball History & Art. In this issue we have stories about the 1928 Philadelphia Athletics (think Cobb, Speaker, Collins, Mack), Sam Rice and his 1912 tornado that killed his young family, there's a story on the Baker Bowl... Oh, two stories on 19th century stars John Clarkson and Charlie Bennett (including his life after his horrific accident)... Billy Southworth, more "Players We Ought to Know"... a story on making art cards...

In short, there's plenty to read about the guys on the cards you own (or want to own). And it is a pretty magazine on substantial paper. Each copy weighs about a pound and costs me a small fortune to mail. But I digress.

Oh, I also took the advice of this board and include a hand-made Lou Gehrig card with each Internet order. The newsstand copies do not come with the card. Anyway, here is a link to this issue on eBay. There are more photos and details there: http://www.ebay.com/itm/Baseball-His...e=STRK:MESE:IT

Thanks, Charles